As I lay dying
on the floor of an abandoned warehouse basement in the bowels of St. Louis, I
couldn’t help but question every choice I’d ever made. Which one of them had
led to this moment? Was it just one? Maybe my entire life had been one poor
decision after another. That seemed the most likely answer as I stared into the
vacant eyes of my partner sprawled out on the concrete not ten feet away.

Will Banks had definitely drawn the short straw
when it came to being paired with me. At the time, it had seemed like divine
intervention. His partner was transferring to a PD down in Florida, and I was finally
getting the promotion I’d had my sights set on since day one. Will had been my
mother’s partner ten years ago. Being paired with him felt like an omen from the
universe. Like a sign from my mom even, that everything was unfolding as it
should.

What a joke.

I thought of Will’s wife and daughter. He’d bragged
about Serena to me just that morning, about the big scholarship she’d been
awarded to go into the engineering program at MU. I could remember babysitting Serena
the summer Will and Alicia had moved to St. Louis. I’d been sixteen, and she
had just turned five. She was all bubblegum cheeks and beaded cornrows, full of
exciting facts from her family’s recent trip to the Gateway Arch. That was
twelve years ago. Had so much time really passed?

I was finally able to think of something worse than
dying in a warehouse basement—facing Will’s family. I wondered who would be
tasked with delivering the news that he was dead. And that it was my fault.

The suspect I’d chased down here was crouched over
me, his face buried in the crook of my neck. Mewling, sucking noises filled my
ears. Terror punched my heart until it felt like it would burst. My hand
trembled around the 9mm pressed into the man’s stomach. I’d already squeezed
off a dozen rounds, but I didn’t have the strength to empty the magazine. I’d
lost too much blood.

I could hardly keep my eyes open, but every time
they refocused, I found myself looking at Will. In the moonlight slipping
through the dusty basement windows, I almost couldn’t tell that it was blood
oozing from his lips and spreading in a puddle under his face. I tried to
pretend that we were back at the precinct. That he’d fallen asleep at his desk
again. Maybe it was just drool. I’d give him hell when he woke up, and he’d joke
for the hundredth time that he needed all the beauty sleep he could get, and
that a young punk like me would know what he was talking about soon enough…

But I’d never know, because I was dying. I’d been
so eager to prove myself worthy of the vice squad, and now I would be nothing
more than a cautionary tale to warn rookie detectives who got too big for their
badges.

Humiliation overpowered my pain, and I found the
strength to squeeze off one last round. The creep gnawing on me barely grunted
at my effort. Meth? PCP? Bath salts?
It was the only explanation my aching brain could come up with. Human
trafficking and drugs. God, this
could have been a career-making bust. A massive launch pad for me, and a grand
finale for Will. That’s what had been on my mind when I saw a flash of movement
through the basement window. And look where it had gotten me.

We’d been staking out the building all week. A
lucky arrest had turned up a tip about a prostitution ring responsible for the
recent surge of missing teens around the city. Will and I had parked our
unmarked car in a dark alleyway between two buildings across the street. There
was scarcely enough room to open our doors, but after four fruitless nights
before this one, it seemed pretty clear that whoever was in charge had been
tipped off and had abandoned the place.

It was almost five in the morning. We were arguing
about where to have breakfast when movement caught my eye. It was a stray dog,
sniffing around the building’s foundation. That’s when I saw something flicker
through a window, something shiny, reflecting the moonlight as it moved around
the basement.

I was out of the car with my gun in hand before I
knew what I was doing. Will hissed at me to wait, to get back in the car. He
said that we needed to call for backup. But my feet moved on their own. There
were young girls being held captive, and we were going to find them. I was sure
of it.

The only thing I was sure of now, with a
drug-addicted cannibal at my throat, was that I was a reckless idiot.

A soft whimper drew my attention to a spot across
the room, and for a moment, I could have sworn I saw a dog lurking in the
corner. I was hallucinating. Great.
At least that meant I wouldn’t have to endure this agony much longer. I was
ready for my life to flash before my eyes and be done with this nightmare. I thought
back as far as I could, trying to jumpstart the event.

One of my earliest memories took place under a
kitchen table. A pink, plastic stethoscope dangling between my blond pigtails,
the business end pressed to the chest of my mother’s first partner, a beautiful
German Shepherd named Maggie.

My mother, Toni Skye, was what the department
called a natural-born hero. She’d worked her way up from patrol to the K9 unit,
and then she’d transferred to vice after we lost Maggie.

Maggie had been my favorite patient. Doctors are not supposed to have favorites,
I’d tell her at every appointment, but I knew she wouldn’t report me to the medical
board.

The memory pulled one corner of my mouth up in a
lazy grin, even as the life drained from my body, and my skin grew cold and
clammy. My muscles slowly unclenched. I couldn’t feel the gun in my hand
anymore. I couldn’t even feel the teeth in my throat, though I could hear them
working me over, a horrid gnashing sound that echoed in my skull.

And then I saw her—a flash of dark fur darting
through the moonlight. Maggie? Had
she come to deliver me from evil?

My vision warped, eyelids fluttering their last as
I began to lose consciousness. I strained to keep them open, waiting to see if
my mother would show next. She always arrived a moment behind Maggie. Why
should it be any different in the afterlife?

As if answering my silent request, the silhouette
of a woman rose up before me, towering over the brute at my neck. My eyes
watered as they rolled back in my head, and my heart strummed out a hopeful staccato.